Donna Close

Associate Director

Donna is a strategic consultant with 25 years’ experience of leadership in arts and culture, working with the private and public sectors, in local government, higher education and arts organisations. Her particular expertise is in place-making including the development of city strategy and partnerships and in creating award winning arts festivals, special events and creative public art programmes. She has significant expertise in fundraising and in creative event design and production, evaluation and impact design.

Donna was Head of Arts at Brighton & Hove City Council, where over eleven years she developed the city’s cultural strategy and led arts and special cultural projects. She was artistic director and producer of the city’s White Night festival, an associate Producer at Brighton Festival and one of the founding trustees of the award winning Brighton Open Air Theatre. Prior to this Donna spent eight years as a Project Producer, for Zap Art creating outdoor arts festivals nationally and in Europe.

She is also Senior Research Fellow at the University of Brighton leading international research projects on creative leadership, cultural production and the experience economy. Donna is a qualified PRINCE 2 practitioner and a Fellow of Royal Society of Arts.